Clockwork Madness
by Roxas Nobody 1318
Summary: (Steampunk themed) What happened when two unlikely people meet for possibly their second time? Roxas wakes finding that he is no longer human, and is on a journey trying to remember who he is. Traveling with the red-head he continues to get flashbacks regarding his past, but what should scare him more, what he forgot, or what he didn't know?


Prologue

The man looked down at the creation once more he finally almost finished; he just needed to put one more thing in place. Picking up the piece he placed it in the chest, finishing off the creation. He smiled joyous, soon he would wake. He no longer had to run up and down, and up and down those stairs anymore, no longer had to look for any other pieces. After oiling the machine he reached his hand inside, and turned the key several times, and the ticking began. He placed his hands on the side of the boy's face, and found a soft smile, he probably wouldn't recall anything, but there wasn't a thing he had forgot.

Chapter 1: Rusted Metals

Darkness was the only thing I could see it devoured me and kept me locked away deep in its clutches. A place I could hardly recall, where I felt nothing, and not a single thought existed. When I felt a sharp pain in my head, as suddenly light was there, I struggled to stare forward at it. The density of the light was impenetrable, when I felt light headed, and that world called to me, the realm of darkness so greedy, that it gripped me so tightly, unwilling to let me be free. I then did see the light get brighter, and brighter as if it persistently insisted I follow, and without yielding stole me away from the darkness I had grown fond of. Slowly the image of all that light and wonder began to dim, and my eyes began to focus. The gears turning several times trying to find the picture in front of me; several clicks and turns and I gazed forward, the bright red color standing out first, I looked toward it and focused on the colors until it was clear. My eyes traveled downward, bright green eyes peered at me, with a smiling grin. I grunted, the pain inside of me growing exponentially. He smiled so softly, but something about him seemed so strange. A queer shock like lighting shot threw my body, and it throbbed threw my veins. When peered down and saw my fingers gently moving in a peculiar motion. I moved then up to my face and watched as they contracted. Feeling the bolts in my arm as they squeaked; "It's a relief to see you awake." His voice was so thick, strong, I heard its strength, but in the moment he used it so softly, so warmly. "W-who are you?" I asked, but my voice didn't sound like me, it was unfamiliar. My facial expression must have shown my confusion. "My name is Axel, get it memorized." I nodded very slowly, my body feeling so heavy, that the weight seemed too impossible to move. He stood, sweeping the air behind him, I watched him as his cheshire grin grew, and he extended a hand toward me. "Come with me." I reached my arm up, extended it slowly and feeling the popping as the metal began to rest in the normal place, I gritted my teeth, focusing on moving the body of metal and steel. I closed my eyes tight and tried to pull myself up, he snatched me up with such great strength, and whisk me up as if I weighed as much as a flower. He put me in his arms and carried me over to a bed, draped in dark purple sheets. The floor creaking and I began to wonder what ever was happening to me.

He laid me down in the bed, and crawled up beside me. The feeling somehow seemed to comforting, and he looked at me, "Just rest, you'll need plenty of it to come." As if my body obeyed I closed my eyes for just a blink and I just fell to sleep. The darkness a greeting but the weight so much easier; but in that darkness something seemed uneasy. Trying to settle into this new…life? I have now acquired in this journey, but something seemed so distinct about this place. As if to say the strange that seemed eerie was in fact well known; and in that thought I heard a clicking, a ticking that echoed. Slowly etching itself into my memory as if it had been there all along, as if the noise was so well known before; just the ticking that lead into another dream.

I ran faster, "Come on!" He was being so annoying, I knew I could make this, it's not my fault he has such longer legs than me. I reached out, every slowly taking his hand and swiftly being pulled into the truck, when my hand slipped, and I became aware I wouldn't make it at this rate. "You idoit, pay attention," Axel stared at me for a moment, rolled his eyes and noticed my struggle, he commented, "Usually you wouldn't mock the person trying to help." With his help I climbed into the truck, it was flying into a town; the town of Blackbay. Well known for mischief, and the crazy things that seemed to dock there. Although Axel and I weren't really heading in that direction, far from it, as soon as the truck to a specific location we were jumping out and heading toward Central. I was just catching my breath, when I felt cold drops of water. "Shit." I mumbled, I knew I couldn't get wet, and with the cold autumn winds it would make the weather far much worse. Axel had a thick blanket that was used to cover the goods in the back of the truck, and threw it over our heads. When the truck came to a sudden halt, he and I were thrown against the bed of the truck, and slammed against crates, while they came sliding into us, we heard the cover get out, and Axel instantly covering everything, including the two of us so we wouldn't be seen. The driver seemed frustrated, he grumbled several times before kicking the truck and walking off for a moment. Axel motioned for me to follow him and so I did, keeping the blanket over our heads we rushed out of the truck, and ran far off towards our desired destiny.

I jumped up, my breath at a panting rate. I tried to calm myself, remembering that dream, it had felt so real. It had felt like I was actually there; I looked beside me and found Axel was nowhere to be seem. Without a single thought I threw myself out of the bed, and looked around the wood, feeling the floor creak below me. I looked out of the window. The skies as they had been in my dream, slightly cloudy and orange tinted. A long dirt road leading from this house to the far distance; I looked around the room; the wall paper red and once crisp, elegant styles stripped up and down it. Now peeling and molding. One picture at the far end of the room, a women. Her face rounded, her hair strung up, her hands crossed over them, sitting tall and elegant. Everything about this place seeming old; her picture having cob webs behind it and over her face so faintly; I looked at her eyes, and something seemed so off about them. Their gray color drawling someone in, I approached it slowly, and lifted my hand up about to whip away the dust when I heard the creaking of the floorboards outside the room, I made to the bed. I quickly covered up and looked to the door that screeched open. Red hair, and dazzling green eyes, "Are you hungry?" I sighed out of all the questions that one is the first one he can think of? He shut the door behind himself, made his way over to me, and placed his hand on my head. "Are you okay, you don't look to well?" He brushed the hair out of my face and I swatted his hand away. "I'm fine." He thought for a moment before his chuckling broke the silence. It startled me at first, and then he looked at me, and that smile from before had come back. He lent me his hand and we went to make our way out. "We need to go see your doctor, but first I need to grab a few things, alright?" I nodded my head and took a step forward, tripping slightly and I fell forward, I braced myself for the floor, and instead had a quick collision with Axel's chest. I laid there for a moment, trying to regain myself, "Are you okay, kid?" "F-fine," I replied and pushed myself away making my way out of the house and looking out at the world it felt I wasn't entering for the first time, perhaps I had been here before?

He and I walked for what felt like hours, upon hours, but the silence between us only made it seem that much worse. Before too long we arrived at a tall building, we went inside; trying to make as less noise as possible. There was tape everywhere, reading: Do not enter, signs and warnings. "Stay here I'll be right back." Axel left me in this room, with white walls, and tables. Some of which had strange and unusual tools on it. I went over to the table knocking a few tools down, I cringed. It was an accident, but out of the corner of my appeared a white sheet, so thin. I lifted it slightly, the skin was porcelain, sustainable with time, human, but unhuman. The devices exposed to the fresh air, the corpse. I jumped back, I wanted to scream, but just couldn't find the strength to make any noise. "Hey, what are you doing here?!" A old man in a white lab coat, stared over at me from across the room, I remember Axel telling me if someone appeared I wasn't to speak with them, I needed to find him. I ran, I needed to get away from this creepy man, and this horrid place, but while running visions and flashes swarmed through my head like bees, something inside of me felt trapped. Like a vice grip around my heart slowly resisting. "Axel!" I yelled his name, only faintly hearing the man behind me, when I ran into a room only worse than before, with many corpses and parts thrown around. I felt my heart hammer in my chest, and had the feeling I was going to become overwhelmed and faint. "Come we have to go." Axel took notice to the urgency and grabs my hand, we ran down halls, and the building just seems to go forever, turning into a maze. A crazy labyrinth I thought I wouldn't escape. When finally we reached a door and Axel shoved me outside and shut the door quick. I felt my limbs trembling, still feeling very fain; we took a moment to catch our breaths. Axel went over to me and without a single word he placed his hand on either side of my face, and held them there. Something about his eyes softened, and he said not a word when his lips gently were placed against my own. I was too shocked to move, but he continued his kiss feeling with intensity, and ravenous desire I had been so blind to. His hands traveled to my waist, as he wrapped his arms around me, I felt myself backing up into the stone slab of the building. His eyes were focused on the ground for several moments, still panting. Before he suddenly looked over at some other deserted buildings, but his eyes seeming neither focused on either. "We-we better get going." I supposed he was right. I nodded slowly, and we walked onward and away from the building. "You don't remember now, but one day you will." I barely heard him speak, but what he said seemed earie, it almost frightened me, how much I had forgot and yet how much had I known? I wasn't sure though what could've frightened me most, what I had known, or what I hadn't.

The day already seemed so tiresome, wearing down on me. I wasn't sure how Axel could bare the work. "W-where are we going?" he looked back at me and only chuckled, "To your doctor where else?" I considered, "Well, where is my doctor?" I asked only out of curiosity, perhaps I would remember something. Axel's strides he took seemed so much perkier. "Only across the desert," Only across the desert, is he kidding me? I sighed; it sounded like a very long journey ahead, and suspiciously reminded me of my dream. Why were we going to the desert in my dream? "Do I know you?" The red headed stopped, and turned to face me smiling. "Only have we met a thousand times." Something about his bubby laughter, made me grin. What did he mean, only a thousand times? "You're not taking this seriously are you?" His grin only grew wider, but it was invited, and much warmer than some before, "me, taking something seriously?" His eyebrows moved in a questioning expression, but playful. "Right, whatever was I thinking?" I asked sarcastically, maybe it was impossible for get him to answer me with some form of seriousness, but what if he was being honest?

If I had thought the trip to the building was long and hard this one seemed much harder. We walked through the desert threw sand storms, and took only a few breaks to rest. Many times the storms would get so bad we lay down in the sand, to get as low as possible and hope the majority of the sand went over us, without us being buried alive. I eventually couldn't see anything, "Axel, I can't see." He looked over at me and took out the oil can we used, and washed out my eyes, and around the corners of my mouth. I must have looked at mess, with oil running down my face, but at least I could see for what it was worth. I laid down that night beside him, while he so easily fell to the grace of sleep; I watched the stars until it could seem they tore themselves from the sky and danced around my head. They brought forth the night sky and brought toward me, until I had come to the term with sleep. My mind was swept away, and stolen from the world it witness fall apart. Unto this place I couldn't comprehend, when another vision began to dance in my head.

"Axel now!" I ran into the army, taking out as many men as I could. They looked at us with eyes that seemed dead. Tearing limb from limb now was my chance. Only a few stood, and I knew after taking so many it was my chance to escape. Axel would never let me go any other day; never did he let me slip from his arms in rest. I felt something for the first time slide down my cheek, I reached my hand up, and touched it, looking at it now; it was just oil. Was I leaking, or would this be considered a cry. I took one last fleeting glance over my shoulder at him. His bright vibrant hair a red as deep as the color of the blood that only existed in a human's veins; green eyes turned away, I couldn't quite get a good look of his face, but I captured a glimpse of a snarl on his lips, as he took out the army one by one. The stance he took brave and fearless, but so foolish. I turned away from the battle there, and I ran, I ran away. Not from him but from myself. The ticking clock inside my chest, the endless noises, and the I couldn't think straight. I was being foolish and I knew then, that this was my biggest mistake, but I thought it was better for him. I wasn't going to look back; I wasn't going to turn back. A repeation of words I only used to console myself. Too bad sometimes things such as that fail to even give someone a little sense or a little time left, but it stopped no feelings, and it didn't stop time from ticking away, and it felt that I could reach my hand to the clock, and yet still couldn't touch the hands that turned no matter the attempts or tactics I used; I doubt he would ever understand.

"Roxas! Roxas?!"

I snapped awake, pulling myself upward and slamming my forehead into another. "Ow." I rubbed my forehead feeling the bruise; I peered over at Axel to find him lying there in the sand, looking upward rubbing his forehead. "What did you do that for!?" He sat up, "It wasn't my fault, I was just trying to get you up." "Oh." I said exasperated. "We're almost the doctor's place," Axel noted, and he pulled a cigarette to his lips, and huffed it down, and out. A puff of smoke leaving his mouth, "What good is smoking those if you have no lungs?" He tapped a finger to his chin, "Well I enjoy the taste myself." "Ew, how can that even taste well, do you know all the chemicals they put in those?" He shrugged, and pulled himself up, he dropped the cig and stomped on it, killing the amber and walked forward with me.

Walking for a while, he looked over me, "How much do you remember?" It was a simple question, but one that was complicated to answer, I couldn't say I remembered anything, but I couldn't say I had forgot anything just yet, not well my systems were still updating, and catching up with themselves. He sighed heavily. "I have something that might help you," and out of his pocket he pulled a watch, it seemed normal enough. He paused and looked over at me, he snatched my wrist. "Hey, watch it." I commanded, I'd rather not have my arm yanked off, but none other than an inconsiderate hunk of metal. He placed the watch upon my wrist, and fastened it. I listened and heard metal clicking; feeling something so strange as small parts of my arm began to connect with the watch. A blue light flashed, and when I looked down at the watch in curiosity, the watch's hands were moving faster than tiny dancer spinning in a music box. "W-what is it doing." Axel drily chuckled, "It's your watch, it connects to your wrist, and it'll show you any day in time, anything that's happened, and any possible future. I've never got it to work, but you use to spend a lot of time watching it. You'd go into a quiet room and wouldn't come out sometimes for days; something about this lousy thing transfixed you." He shrugged momentarily, then continued, "When you had gone missing, all it would tell me was the time, it stopped lighting up, and it was the only thing you left; after a while, even the hands on the clock it's self just stopped moving, as it the world for this very device had ended and the time was up." I gazed down at the watch and watched as it came back to life, dials spinning so fast, you'd think it'd never stop, but something about it gave me a calm feeling.

"Axel what was I like then?" He smiled, almost too pleased then to speak about me, "Well you were always something captivating, most people saw you as mysterious, but I feel it was because you spent so much time alone. I was really the only one you told anything to, and sometimes I didn't even really understand." The way he talked about me, made me seem so strange, why would I ever want the complete solitude of a lonely life? Why would I only reside in him, what was so special? Despite the unending mound of questions I stayed silent and nodded, listening to him ramble on about something. Soon enough a building appeared in the distance and my feet couldn't have been so thankful then in that moment. I noticed a man lounging about the door, "Boys, bout' time you made it back, come in, come in." He swung the door open and walked inside, I paused something about this place made me uneasy. Why trusts a man I didn't even remember my relationship with? Axel stepped up beside me, "Come on." He pushed me inside the building much to my demise; I turned to snap on him, when turned and just sort of froze.

The man turned and smiles at me, "Roxas, it's so nice to see you again." Something about the metal inside of me seemed to chill, and I was suddenly very aware of ever part in me that was unhuman. Axel could tell, and he reached down to grab my hand, but I snatched away. I didn't want his physical support, I wasn't sure why he took me here, but I didn't want to be here. This man, "my doctor" was the very man that had turned me into the gear grinding thing I had become, and if I remembered correctly I had sworn to hate for the rest of my life. I felt sick, something about this atmosphere dropped very quickly, and the man was trying too hard for a smile, and it sickened me. I pushed Axel back, in a hurry to get out of this room, I went down the hall and found the first room, I went inside and slammed the door. I tried to take a breath, but something inside rattled. I went to the bathroom and placed my hands on the porcelain sink, when I heard a tapping on the door. "Roxas?" I knew the voice, and didn't want to even see him; I couldn't face him right now. Not after this sort of betrayal, the rapping stopped, and a creaking from the doors hinges caused me to cringe. I turned fast, he had barely slipped in, when I went to slap his face hard, he grabbed my wrist. "Let go of me!" He disobeyed, and instead grab my other hand, and I wrestled uncontrollably, "Let me go." He sighed, "Just take a moment to listen to me." I was infuriated, "Why should I?" He rolled his eyes, and if I could've got away I would've left. "I know you don't like him, but he is your only chance, and you know it." I struggled against him, unable to wrestle free, I finally quit, and sunk down to the ground, he released my hands, and crotched beside me. He finally kicked the door shut behind him, and pulled a beverage out of his coat, he handed it to me. I took it cannily, and drank liberally. I had no idea what it was, but it tasted well, and that's all that mattered.


End file.
